MOR Announces 2026/27 Season • Illuminations: Music for Our Shared Humanity
Members of the Music of Remembrance Chamber Ensemble / photo by Ben Van Houten
Music of Remembrance Announces 2026/27 Season
Illuminations: Music for Our Shared Humanity
Steve Reich’s 90th Birthday & Sahba Aminikia’s Stormy Seas
Seattle • November 1, 2026
World Premiere of Lori Laitman’s Bonaco
Seattle • January 25, 2027
World Premieres by Milad Yousufi & Donald Byrd
Seattle • March 14, 2027
Jake Heggie’s Camille Claudel: Into the Fire
Seattle • May 16, 2027
San Francisco • May 23, 2027
SEATTLE, WA – August 6, 2026 – For nearly three decades, Music of Remembrance (MOR) has created one of the country’s most significant bodies of socially engaged repertoire for voice, chamber ensemble, and dance. On the heels of its landmark 50th commission, MOR announces its 2026/27 season, Illuminations: Music for Our Shared Humanity. These concerts place disparate compositions into conversation with one another, exploring the personal stories behind headlines and history.
Across four programs, MOR’s season includes commissioned world premieres from Lori Laitman and Afghan composer Milad Yousufi, new choreography by Spectrum Dance Theater’s Donald Byrd, and the Seattle premiere of Jake Heggie’s acclaimed theatrical song cycle Camille Claudel: Into the Fire. These stories trace journeys across continents and generations, from refugees crossing dangerous seas to Afghan women reclaiming their voices, with music that speaks powerfully to the present moment.
"Every season begins with the same questions: which stories demand our attention right now, and how can music reveal the threads that connect these stories to one another – and to us?" said Artistic Director Mina Miller. "While the answers shift through the years, our responsibility does not. Every commission becomes part of a living repertoire that carries these stories forward – not as a historical record, but as something future generations can continue to perform, question, and learn from."
Composer Sahba Aminikia before a world premiere with Music of Remembrance / photo by Nick Klein
Journeys
November 1, 2026 • Benaroya Hall in Seattle
MOR opens the season with Journeys, a program built around narratives of displacement and hope. Aligned with the composer’s 90th birthday, Steve Reich’s Different Trains layers the sounds of his childhood cross-country trips in America with echoes of the trains that carried European children toward a very different fate. MOR commission Stormy Seas, by Iranian American composer Sahba Aminikia, tells the true stories of five child refugees who crossed dangerous waters in search of safety in new lands. The program also includes songs from We Go On, Oswego, honoring women who found refuge in America's only World War II refugee camp, performed by mezzo-soprano Lily Bogas, and “Lyric” from Black American composer George Walker’s Lyric String Quartet, written for the grandmother who survived slavery.
Members of Seattle Girls Choir and Northwest Boychoir / photo by Ben Van Houten
Art From Ashes
January 25, 2027 • Benaroya Hall in Seattle
MOR's annual free community concert honors International Holocaust Remembrance Day, marking the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. This year, two of the Pacific Northwest’s most prominent groups of young musical talent appear. The Seattle Girls Choir Prime Voci premieres composer Lori Laitman’s Bonaco, a new MOR choral commission setting the words of teenage girl prisoners in the Terezín concentration camp, while the Northwest Boychoir performs a new choral arrangement of haunting songs by composer Viktor Ullmann, written in Terezín before he was sent to his death in Auschwitz. Soprano Madeline Ross and the MOR Chamber Ensemble perform works by other composers from across Nazi-controlled Europe who perished in the Holocaust.
Composer Milad Yousufi and soprano Vanessa Isiguen with Music of Remembrance Chamber Ensemble / photo by Ben Van Houten
Resilience
March 14, 2027 • Benaroya Hall in Seattle
Two world premieres anchor Resilience. Afghan-born composer Milad Yousufi debuts a new work, written for soprano Vanessa Isiguen and giving voice to the lived experiences of Afghan women, while Donald Byrd and Spectrum Dance Theater premiere new choreography to Erwin Schulhoff's Five Pieces for String Quartet. Armenian American composer Mary Kouyoumdjian's Boy and a Makeshift Toy, from her Children of Conflict series, captures the realities of children growing up amid the devastation of war.
Mezzo-soprano Nikola Printz / photo by Destiny Grace
Women in the Shadows
May 16, 2026 • Benaroya Hall in Seattle
May 23, 2026 • Presidio Theatre in San Francisco
Closing the season, Women in the Shadows is devoted to female artists whose talents outstripped their renown. The centerpiece is Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer's theatrical song cycle Camille Claudel: Into the Fire, reclaiming the voice of the brilliant French sculptor too often remembered only as Auguste Rodin’s muse. Mezzo-soprano Nikola Printz, praised by the San Francisco Chronicle for performances that are "heartrending, musically resplendent," takes on the title role. Works by Florence Price, Vítězslava Kaprálová, Rebecca Clarke, Lili Boulanger, and Iranian American composer Niloufar Nourbakhsh further explore the artistic legacies of women whose work deserves renewed recognition.
Journeys
Sunday, November 1, 2026 @ 3:00pm
Featuring: Different Trains by Steve Reich, in honor of the composer's 90th birthday
Plus works by Sahba Aminikia and George Walker
with Lily Bogas, mezzo-soprano
Benaroya Hall (200 University Street)
Seattle, Washington
Tickets $60; Students $25 (ID required)
https://musicofremembrance.org/show-details/journeys
Art From Ashes
Monday, January 25, 2027 @ 5:30pm
World Premiere: Bonaco by Lori Laitman00
with Seattle Girls Choir; Madeline Ross, soprano
Plus works by Viktor Ullmann and other composers who perished in the Holocaust
with Northwest Boychoir; Eli Rutten, clarinet, and Eliana Cobbs, violin (2026 recipients of Music of Remembrance’s David Tonkonogui Memorial Award)
Benaroya Hall (200 University Street)
Seattle, Washington
Tickets: Free, reservations required.
https://musicofremembrance.org/show-details/afa2027
Resilience
Sunday, March 14, 2027 @ 3:00pm
World Premiere: New Work by Milad Yousufi
with Vanessa Isiguen, soprano; Parastou Ashori, narrator & librettist
World Premiere Choreography: Five Pieces for String Quartet
Choreographed by Donald Byrd to music by Erwin Schulhoff
with Spectrum Dance Theater
Plus works by Mary Kouyoumdjian and Kurt Weill
with Michael Brockman and the Northwest Saxophone Quartet
Benaroya Hall (200 University Street)
Seattle, Washington
Tickets $60; Students $25 (ID required)
https://musicofremembrance.org/show-details/resilience
Women in the Shadows
Seattle • San Francisco
Featuring: Camille Claudel: Into the Fire by Jake Heggie and Gene Scheer
with Nikola Printz, mezzo-soprano
Plus works by Lili Boulanger, Rebecca Clarke, Vítězslava Kaprálová, Niloufar Nourbakhsh, and Florence Price
Sunday, May 16, 2027 @ 4:00pm
Seattle, Washington
Benaroya Hall (200 University Street)
Tickets $60; Students $25 (ID required)
https://musicofremembrance.org/show-details/shadows
Sunday, May 23, 2027 @ 4:00pm
San Francisco, California
Presidio Theatre (99 Moraga Avenue)
Tickets $40–$70
https://www.presidiotheatre.org/show-details/music-of-remembrance-women-in-the-shadows
About Music of Remembrance
Established in 1998, Music of Remembrance (MOR) pays tribute to historic memory and directly confronts challenges to human rights and dignity today. In addition to its work discovering and performing music from the Holocaust, MOR is admired around the world for its leadership in commissioning, having premiered 50 new works by leading composers as of its 2025/26 season. This includes varied chamber ensembles, song cycles, choral works, dance music, film scores, musical dramas, and full-length operas – all using art to examine compelling issues in today’s world. MOR’s nine albums, three documentary films, and extensive outreach programs extend that impact well beyond the concert hall.
Press Contact: Beth Stewart
Verismo Communications
Email: beth@verismopr.com
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